“Putin’s actions are sufficient, “to demonstrate to
anyone who is still not convinced that the Kremlin
leader has a far larger agenda than “only Ukraine,”
one that completely undermines the 1991 settlement
and even that of 1945.

“Yana Amelina, a well-connected Russian analyst,
says that Moscow’s annexation of Crimea is “a
precedent for South Ossetia and the entire post-
Soviet space,” the most expansive Russian
interpretation yet of what Putin intends…

“The non-recognition of the results of the Crimean
referendum by the West, Ukraine and Georgia,” the
Russian analyst continues, “demonstrates only the
failure by these states to understand both their own
place in the world and that this very world has
irreversible change and never again will be what
it was before.”

“Moreover, everyone needs to recognize that there
are three reasons why “Russia in no way can be
limited to a single Crimea.” First, she says, there
are millions of Russian speakers in Ukraine who
are suffering from repression and need to be
protected. “Moscow will not leave its brothers to
the caprice of fate.”

“Second, Moscow must “solve the fate of Trandniestria”
now caught “between Ukraine and Moldova, and
“this will be possible only after the re-unification
of Russia and Novo-Rossiya,” in short although she
does not use this term by Russian occupation of all
of southern Ukraine and possibly more.

“Georgia which has been Ukraine’s ally should
“reflect upon the further existence of its state or
more precisely of what [currently] remains of it.”
Given Iranian and Turkish interest in a transportation
corridor in this region, “’the Georgian question’
again is acquiring particular importance.”